Tag: political prisoner

Friends, I rarely ask you to help someone financially, so please pay attention this post.

Journalist and human rights activist Sergei Mokhnatkin needs our help. Mr. Mokhnatkin is sixty-four years old. While he has been serving time in a penal colony, he has been assaulted, had his back broken, had suffocating gas pumped into his cell, and had his personal effects and food stolen. Andrei Krekov, Mr. Mokhnatin’s social defender, arrived yesterday from visiting him in prison.

Mr. Krekov said the wardens at Maximum Security Correctional Colony No. 21 in the village of Iksa, Arkhangelsk Region, where Mr. Mokhnatkin has been serving the last four months of his sentence, have put the inmate on preventive watch as someone “prone to trespassing on sexual freedom and sexual inviolability” [per the wording in the letter reproduced below]. This is yet another humiliation.

Letter from a prison official informing Sergei Mokhnatkin that he had been placed on “preventive watch.” Photo by Andrei Krekov. Courtesy of Julia Lorenz

As of Monday, prison staff refused to give Mr. Mokhnatkin a pen, so he was unable to write anything.

In his letter to me, Mr. Mokhnatkin voiced concern about whether he would be able to pay Mr. Krekov’s trips to the prison as his social defender and, generally, a sense of insecurity about the future. I cannot discuss the particulars of his personal life without his say-so, but I can say that Mr. Mokhnatkin lacks many of the things you and I have.

The only way to protect the journalist and human rights activist from the abuse of prison staff is constant oversight on the social defender’s part. A single one-way trip to the penal colony costs 4,000 rubles [approx. 50 euros] and takes four hours. Nor would it hurt if we were able to raise a little money to see Mr. Mokhnatkin through for awhile after he is released from prison.

Yevgenia Litvinova. Her placard reads, “Crimean Tatars are not terrorists! Free political prisoners! Emir Hussein Kuku, a member of the Crimean Human Rights Group, has been on hunger strike since June 26.” Photo courtesy of Ms. Litvinova’s Facebook page

We arrived at Strategy 18 ahead of time yesterday, but we started our pickets half an hour later.

An unauthorized rally against raising the retirement age was planned to take place on Malaya Sadovaya Street. They might have needed help. Paddy wagons were lined up on the Nevsky. It was understood people would be arrested. That was what happened.

Two hundred people attended the protest rally. Fourteen of them were detained, including Father Grigory Mikhnov-Voytenko, a member of the Petersburg Human Rights Council. The detainees were driven from one police precinct to another for three hours. They were released around midnight.

Why do so few people defend their own interests? Are they afraid? Yes. Was the rally poorly advertised? That, too. But there is also an indifference to everything and everyone, including oneself.

Around a year ago, in September 2017, we organized a Peace March. It was also unauthorized, of course. Approximately three hundred people showed up. It was understandable: people are fed up with the antiwar agenda. They want to isolate themselves from other people’s corpses and the crimes of their own government.

Pensions affectly them directly, however. They are the ones whose money is being stolen, lots of money when you add it up. Yet people are again okay with everything.

“Should I bring the rope [to hang me]?”

At seven-thirty, we went back to our own plan, pulling out placards about the persecution of the Crimean Tatars. Natalia Voznesenskaya and I stood together for reasons of safety. There were tons of hired thugs [titushki] out on the Nevsky yesterday. They all claimed to be Crimeans who had just arrived from Crimea. You would have thought Crimea had sent a landing force to the shores of the Neva.

When they walked by us, they would shout the same thing.

“It’s not true! It doesn’t exist! You’re making it all up!”

What doesn’t exist?

My placard featured a picture of Emir Hussein Kuku, who has gone on hunger strike. What was not true? Did Kuku not exist? Did he not go on hunger strike?

There has been good news from Kuku’s wife. He ended his hunger strike today, July 19. However, his hand was forced by the rapid deterioration of his health.

That was today, though. His hunger strike lasted twenty-four days.

I have a young lady friend who is three years old. “No” and “not” are currently the keywords in her vocabulary.

When the first two lines of Samuil Marshak’s famous children’s poem “What a Scatterbrain”—”A scatterbrained man lived / on Basin Street”—are read to Sonya, she comments, “He did not live. He was not a man. He was not scatterbrained. It was not on Basin Street.”

It was exactly like that at our protest yesterday. A woman holding a child’s hand shouted the memorized text at us. She didn’t hesitate to look that way in front of the child. Or she thought the child didn’t understand what mom was saying.

There was also an attack on one of our picketers. Alexander Khmelyov was standing on Anichkov Bridge. One of the hawkers who encourages people to go on boat trips, a huge man in his thirties who could just as well have been tossing heavy sacks for a living, tore Alexander’s placard from his hands and tossed it into the Fontanka River.

We complained to the police. We pointed the attacker out to them.

Their response?

“Go to the precinct and file a complaint.”

The guardians of order didn’t bother to go up and talk to the attacker.

Vladimir Balukh’s 100 Days: The Crimean Euromaidan Supporter Has Been on Hunger Strike in Remand Prison for Over Three Months
Anna KozkinaMediazona
June 27, 2018

Vladimir Balukh. Photo by Anton Naumlyuk. Courtesy of RFE/RL

Today [July 1, 2018] is the [104th] day of a hunger strike by Vladimir Balukh, who awaits a verdict in his third criminal trial in Simferopol Remand Prison. In 2014, he refused to accept Russian citizenship, raising the Ukrainian flag over his house in solidarity with the Euromaidan protests. The first criminal case against Balukh was opened in 2015. It would be followed by two more case. In the article below, Mediazona catalogues the persecution the Crimean activist has endured and describes his hunger strike, during which he has lost at least thirty kilos.

On June 22, 2018, Balukh, who is imprisoned in Simferopol Remand Prison, said he was returning to the harsher form of hunger strike and would now only be drinking water. Balukh had been drinking fruit drink for some time.

Olga Dinze, Balukh’s defense attorney, said the cause was increased pressure from prison wardens. In court, Balukh had spoken of regular searches of his cell, including at night. According to him, prison wardens and guard have hinted it was time for him to “go down in the hole,” i.e., be sent to solitary confinement.

The following day, Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Lyudmila Denisova requested Pierre-Emmanuel Ducruet, head of the International Red Cross’s Simferopol office, visit Balukh at the remand prison and secure professional medical care for him.

The Flag, Heaven’s Hundred Heroes Street, and the Insulted FSB Agent
In late 2013, Crimean farmer Vladimir Balukh raised a Ukrainian flag over his house in the village of Serebryanka in solidarity with the Euromaidan demonstrators. The flag stayed there after the March 2014 referendum. Balukh did not recognize Crimea’s annexation by Russia and refused to apply for a Russian passport.

Police and Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) agents first paid him a visit in the spring of 2015. Balukh was not home when they arrived. When he heard about the visit to his home by the security services, he stayed with friends for several days. The police and FSB searched Balukh’s house and also paid his mother a call.

The security services visited Balukh for the second time in November 2015. Claiming he was suspected of auto theft, they searched his house again. After the search, the farmer was charged with insulting a government official, a violation under Article 319 of the Russian Criminal Code. Allegedly, Balukh had used “foul, insulting language when addressing field agent Yevgeny Baranov, which the latter found unpleasant.” Balukh did not deny he could have sworn at the field agent, since FSB officers had punched him in the kidneys and stepped on his head after throwing him on the ground.

In February 2016, the Razdolnoye District Court found Balukh guilty, sentencing him to 320 hours of community service. Subsequently, the Crimean Supreme Court sent the case back to the lower court for review, but in June the district court reaffirmed its original guilty verdict, again sentencing Balukh to 320 hours of community service.

The Ukrainian flag was torn down from the farmer’s house again and again, but he put it back up every time. On November 29, 2016, the third anniversary of the Euromaidan protests, Balukh hung a sign on his house, identifying the address as “Heaven’s Hundred Heroes Street, 18.” Two weeks later, police and FSB carried out yet another search of his house. This time, they allegedly found eighty-nine rounds of ammunition and several TNT blocks in the attic. After the search, the flag and the street sign were removed from Balukh’s house. Balukh was detained and later remanded to police custody.

Balukh was charged with illegal possession of weapons and explosives (Article 222 Part 1 and Article 222.1 Part 1 of the Russian Criminal Code). The farmer claimed his innocence and said his political stance was the reason for the criminal prosecution. He claimed the rounds of ammo and explosives were planted during the search. Police allegedly found them in the presence of a single official witness.

The Memorial Human Rights Center designated Balukh a political prisoner. It noted that he had received clear threats after hanging the street sign on his home memorializing the murdered Maidan protesters.

“It was after this that the chair of the village council and his deputies visited Balukh’s home and threatened that his independent behavior would have unpleasant consequences, including the ‘discovery’ in Balukh’s house of weapons or narcotics. He demanded Balukh take the sign down,” wrote Memorial.

Memorial argued that the prosecution had not proven the ammunition actually belonged to Balukh, since his fingerprints were not found on the items.

Vladimir Balukh’s House. Photo courtesy of hromadske.ua

“Go to Ukraine and Treat Your Back There”
On August 4, 2017, the Raznodolnoye District Court sentenced Balukh to three years and seven months in a medium security penal colony and a fine of ₽10,000 [approx. €136] for possession of the ammunition and TNT.

A week after Balukh was sentenced, he had a run-in with Valery Tkachenko, warden of the Razdolnoye Temporary Detention Facility. According to Balukh, Tkachenko punched him in the shoulder and tried to kick him as well. He also, allegedly, made insulting remarks about the ethnicity of Balukh and his parents. Balukh’s attorney filed a complaint with the police.

Two weeks later, the Investigative Committee opened a case against Balukh himself, claiming he had violated Article 318 Part 1 of the Criminal Code (violence against a state official). Subsequently, Balukh’s alleged actions were reclassified as a violation of Article 321 Part 2 (disrupting the operations of penitentiary facilities). According to police investigators, on the morning of August 11, 2017, Balukh had elbowed the warden in the stomach while his cell was being inspected. He then, allegedly, entered his cell and struck Tkachenko’s arm.

In November 2017, the district court commenced its review of the ammunition possession case, and in December Balukh was transferred from the remand prison to house arrest. After complaining of pain in his back and groin, Balukh was soon taken to hospital straight from the courtroom.

At the district hospital, medical staff merely measured his blood pressure and gave him a cardiogram. After listening to Balukh’s complaints, the local doctor said, “My back hurts, too. Should I not go to work or what?”

Balukh asked the court permission to travel to Simferopol or Feodosia for a medical examination, but his request was turned down. During his December 27 court hearing, the ambulance was called several times due to Balukh’s temperature, high blood pressure, and back pain. According to the news website Krym.Realii, the head physician of the local hospital’s emergency department, Nadezhda Drozdenko, told Balukh, “Go to Ukraine and treat your back there.” When the hearing went on for ten hours, Balukh lay down on the floor due to the severe pain.

Balukh was again sent to the remand prison. He has continued to complain of back pain, whose cause doctors have never been able to diagnose.

“He Has Adopted a Stance of Hopelessness”
After the Crimean Supreme Court upheld the verdict in the ammunition possession case, Balukh went on an indefinite hunger strike as of March 19, 2018. He gave up all food, only drinking water and tea, protesting what he regarded as the illegal verdict against him.

In late March, Balukh was assaulted in the remand prison and hospitalized in the infirmary, as reported by Aktivatika, who quoted defense attorney Olga Dinze.

“The hunger strike has been difficult for him. Besides, the prison wardens have engaged in constant provocations. They have brought him delicious food, enticing him to eat. It destabilizes him a bit, but he has hung and kept his word,” said the lawyer.

Vladimir Balukh on June 22, 2018. Photo by Zair Semedlyaev. Courtesy of crimeahrg.rog

In mid April, his social defender, Archbishop Kliment of Simferopol and Crimea, reported Balukh had been assaulted by guards.

A month later, Vladimir Chekrygin, an expert with the Crimean Human Rights Group, toldKrim.Realii Balukh was under pressure in the remand prison.

“We know the guards at the remand prison have periodically threatened Balukh for his actions. They have told him that sooner or latter he would be punished for his willfulness. They have been doing searches in his cell night and mornings. Searches are permitted, but at certain hours and under extraordinary circumstances. They are not letting him rest,” Chekrygin explained.

On May 18, Russian human rights ombudsman Tatyana Moskalkova visited the Simferopol Remand Prison. She wrote to her Ukrainian colleague, Lyudmila Denisova, that Balukh had no complaints either about the conditions of his incarceration or cruel treatment.

In May, the Raznodolnoye District Court began hearing the third criminal case against Balukh, involving his run-in with the temporary detention facility warden. During the trial, even the prosecution’s witnesses, guards at the facility, testified Balukh did not assault the wardeb. During the investigation, the alleged victim refused to take part in a face-to-face confrontation with Balukh, who described his behavior in great detail to the judge.

“He would come to my cell and try to insult me, to humiliate me for being Ukrainian and thus, as he thought, for being a member of Right Sector. He would say us Ukrainians should be murdered as a species, and so on,” said Balukh.

On June 10, Balukh was again transferred from Razdolnoye to the Simferopol Remand Prison. There he was put in the “glass,” a narrow cell in which one can only stand or sit, for two hours, Crimean human rights defenders reported.

The following day, it transpired the remand prison wardens no longer believed Balukh was on hunger strike. The guards had learned Balukh was drinking not only water but also oatmeal kissel. Archbishop Kliment had persuaded Balukh to make the compromise a month after he started his hunger strike.

“Vladimir agreed. We know he began consuming only kissel. Sometimes, he has honey and bread crumbs at most. At some point, the prison wardens found out about the kissel and decided not to recognize his actions as a hunger strike. There are special rules when wardens decide a prisoner has gone on hunger strike. They have stopped following these rules when it comes to Balukh, since they believe he is no longer on hunger strike. But Vladimir has continued his protest. He has lost thirty kilos of weight. The doctor from the remand prison infirmary has stopped making regular checkups of Balukh, although he is obliged to do so when inmates go on hunger strike,” explained Olga Skripnik, head of the Crimean Human Rights Group.

Protesting constant inspections in the remand prison, Balukh returned on June 22, 2018, to the original form of his hunger strike. He has again been only drinking water. Olga Dinze explained the frequent searches of Balukh’s cell as a consequence of Balukh’s having filed a motion to be paroled for his first criminal conviction.

On June 25, Dinze told Mediazona her client’s condition had taken a turn for the worse.

“I think Balukh has suffered a pinched nerve. It is a quite serious case. He has been experiencing severe pain in his chest, neck, and shoulder blades. He feels unwell all the time,” Dinze said, adding the new symptoms were probably due to long-term back pain.

According to Dinze, Balukh was not receiving medical care.

“He refuses cares from the doctors in the remand prison. They cannot give him the medical care he needs, diagnose him, and prescribe him appropriate treatment. He has requested doctors from the Red Cross,” said Dinze.

The defense attorney added that, after Balukh stopped drinking oat kissel, he was transferred to a cell in the general population, but the conditions there were decent. He currently has no complaints against the wardens.

Earlier, Dinze told Krym.Realii Balukh had been hoping for a prisoner exchange.

“Vladimir is quite weary. He is emotionally exhausted. He has adopted a stance of hopelessness. He says no one will ever release him from prison. If they cannot keep him in prison on the current convictions, there will be new charges. So now he is finally talking. For the last few months we have been talking about how, if there is a prisoner exchange and everything goes well, he would really, really like to go to mainland Ukraine,” said Dinze.

The Ukrainian authorities have recently repeatedly stated their readiness to exchange Russian convicts for the sixty-four Ukrainian nationals imprisoned in Russian remand prisons and penal colonies, including Balukh and filmmaker Oleg Sentsov, who has been on hunger strike since mid May.

Closing arguments in Warden Tkachenko’s case against Balukh have been scheduled for July 2.

Thanks to Yegor Skovoroda for the heads-up. Translated by the Russian Reader

This map, published by Amnesty International, shows the geography of Oleg Sentsov’s ordeal, from his arrest in occupied Crimea, in May 2014, to his arrival at the Labytnangi Correctional Colony, north of the Arctic Circle, in October 2017. Courtesy of Let My People Go!

Ukrainian film director and political prisoner Oleg Sentsov is in the midst of his forty-fifth day on hunger strike in the maximum security penal colony, north of the Arctic Circle, where the Putin regime sentenced him to twenty years for the thought crime of not approving its illegal occupation of Crimea in 2014.

Sentsov’s only demand is that the Putin regime release the several dozen other Ukrainian political prisoners it has imprisoned.

It should also release Mr. Sentsov, made to suffer for a crime he did not commit. (He was convicted on terrorism charges). It would be a gesture of peace and reconciliation appreciated round the world, especially during the World Cup, which Russia is currently hosting.

But I am not holding my breath. Russia has been misruled for the last twenty years by a clique of KGB officers who morphed into some of the most reckless and impudent gangsters the world has ever seen once the Soviet Union collapsed. Yet this utterly destructive regime gets oodles of aid and comfort from the international far left and far right, as well as corrupt entities like FIFA and the London City, who want to partake in Russia’s embezzled riches.

A wiseguy like Putin knows this and, I am afraid, has calculated that the fallout from Sentsov’s death in prison is an acceptable risk. Releasing Sentsov, on the other hand, would show that Putin is susceptible to pressure from the outside world. Unless I am misreading him, he is loath to do this, at least in an obvious way. // TRR

Rally in support of Oleg Sentsov in Paris. Photo courtesy of Krym.Realii and Mediazona

Mediazona journalist Yegor Skovoroda writes that Ukrainian political prisoner and filmmaker Oleg Sentsov has been on hunger strike in a Russian penal colony for 23 days.

Filmmaker Askold Kurov, who made a terrific documentary film about Sentsov’s case, The Trial, has been to visit him there.

“He didn’t know any news. He didn’t know that [his co-defendant Simferopol anarchist Alexander] Kolchenko had gone on hunger strike. He didn’t call on anyone to join the hunger strike, especially Kolochenko, who is not in very good shape. But he feels solidarity with everyone who supports him. He knew nothing about the international campaign to support him, and he was quite grateful to everyone for not forgetting him,” said Kurov. “He continues to write and edit screenplays and stories. He has written a novel.”

The testimony of the prosecution’s witnesses diverged during the latest hearing in the third trial of the Crimean Ukrainian political activist Vladimir Balukh, who allegedly assaulted Valery Tkachenko, warden of the Interior Ministry’s Temporary Detention Facility in the Razdolnoye District, reports the news website Krym.Realii.

Duty officer Mikhail Shubin claimed Balukh wanted to attack Tkachenko, but the guards holding the political prisoner stopped him from doing it. At the same time, Shubin claimed Balukh had “taunted” the warden.

Meanwhile, the facility’s deputy warden, Dmitry Karpunov, testified he did not see the conflict itself. He could only report Tkachenko had entered Balukh’s cell, whence an “intense conversation” was audible, and then the warden exited the cell stained with some kind of liquid.

Karpunov said there had been no attack. Balukh had not committted any violations of prison regulations, not counting his refusal to put his hands behind his back.

The Crimean Human Rights Groupreports a total of five witnesses were questioned during Tuesday’s hearing. Aside from Shubin and Karpunov, they included temporary detention facility staffers Seyran Mambetov, duty officer Sergei Tishin, and technician Alexander Konovalov, who extracted the recordings from the CCTV cameras. The Crimean SolidarityFacebook page identifies Konovalov as Balukh’s aquaintance.

Our correspondent reports that, during his testimony, Major Mambetov said, “We are not the Gestapo. We don’t assault people. We police officers do not offend anyone, and we treat all convicts the same.”

The next hearing was scheduled for Wednesday, March 16.

Balukh went on hunger strike on March 19, 2018. May 15 was thus the fifty-eighth day of his protest against the unjust verdict in his previous trial, in which he was convicted of illegally possessing ammunition. On Tuesday, the Crimean Human Rights Group published a letter from Baluch, in which the political prisoner wrote that, on the twenty-fifth day of his hunger strike, his social defender, Archbishop Kliment of the Simferopol and Crimean Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate, urged him to moderate his hunger strike. Whereas earlier Balukh had consumed only water and tea, after his conversation with Kliment he drank two glasses of oatmeal kissel and ate fifty to seventy grams of dried breadcrumbs everyday, and added honey to his tea.

Balukh made the decision, he wrote, “To rule out the possibility of forced feeding and the use of medical means of life support I have not authorized, and also to avoid causing irreparable grief to my loved ones.”

Earlier, Balukh’s common-law wife Natalya had pointed out her husband suffered from liver disease, and it was unacceptable for him to go on hunger strike.

Vladimir Balukh and his attorneys Olga Dinze and Taras Omelchenko, May 15, 2018. Photo by Alexandra Yefimenko. Courtesy of Grani.Ru

The hearing on the merits of Baluch’s third trial began April 2. Tatyana Pyrkalo, chair of the Razdolnoye District Court, which is controlled by Russia, has presided over the trial. Aside from Archbishop Kliment, Balukh is defended by three professional lawyers, Dmitry Dinze, Olga Dinze, and Taras Omelchenko. Ms. Dinze and Mr. Omelchenko were present at Tuesday’s hearing.

The 47-year-old Balukh, a farmer from the village of Serebryanka in the Razdolnoye District, has beeen charged under Article 321 Part 2 of the Russian Criminal Code (non-threatening violence against a penitentiary officer during performance of his duties), which is punishable by a maximum of five years in a penal colony. According to the prosecution, on August 11, 2017, during morning rounds of the cells at the Razdolnoye Temporary Detention Facility, where Balukh had been transferred from a remand prison while he attended his second trial, Balukh struck Warden Tkachenko in the stomach with his elbow while they were in the hallway, after which he went into his cell, grabbed a bottle of detergent, and struck the policeman on the arm.

Actually, Tkachenko himself assaulted Balukh, insulted his ethnicity, and swore at him. Moreover, these actions were captured by CCTV cameras. We also know the warden had verbally assaulted Balukh prior to the incident. Balukh was framed on the new charges after his defense lawyers filed a complaint against Warden Tkachenko with the police.

During the pretrial investigation, conducted by N. Bondarenko, an official with the Razdolnoye Interregional Department of the Russian Investigative Committee, Warden Tkachenko refused to report to a face-to-face confrontation with Balukh, although Russian law does not provide this right to victims.

Until today, only two hearings had been held in the case. Warden Tkachenko took the witness stand at the second hearing, on April 11.

As defense lawyer Dmitry Dinze noted after the hearing, “The funniest thing about the whole case is that the so-called victim has not evinced any get-up-and-go. The criminal charges did not interest him at all. He was ordered to file a report and draw up all the papers in order to get the case opened. Personally, he has no material and emotional gripes against my client. It transpires the Razdolnoye District Police Department had a stake in cooking up more criminal charges against Balukh.”

In December 2013, during the early weeks of the Revolution of Dignity, Balukh hung the red and black flag of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) above his home in the village of Serebryanka. After awhile, the flag was surreptitiously torn down at night, and the farmer replaced it with the Ukrainian national flag. After Crimea was occupied, Balukh did not apply for Russian citizenship.

Balukh was convicted for the first time in 2016 and sentenced to 320 hours of community service for, allegedly, offending a government official, as stipulated by Article 319 of the Russian Criminal Code. The “victim” in this case was Lieutenant Yevgeny Baranov, a field officer with the Center for Extremism Prevention (Center “E”), who was involved in searching Balukh’s home in November 2015.

Balukh faced trumped-up charges for the second time after he attached a sign inscribed “Heaven’s Hundred Heroes Street, 18″ on his house. He was jailed in a remand prison, where he was imprisoned for nearly a year before he was transferred to house arrest. He was returned to the remand prison after his conviction on the second set of charges. Balukh was charged under Article 222 Part 1 (illegal trafficking of ammunitition) and Article 222.1 Part 1 (illegal trafficking of explosives) after police planted gunshells and TNT blocks in his home during a routine search. Earlier this year, Balukh was sentenced to three years and five months in an open penal colony.

Wife of Antifascist Filinkov Seeks Political Asylum in FinlandMediazona
April 10, 2018

Alexandra Aksyonova, wife of antifascist Viktor Filinkov, who spoke of being tortured by Russian Federal Security (FSB) officers and is currently being held in a remand prison outside Petersburg, has left Kyiv and requested political asylum in Finland. She reported the news to Mediazona herself.

She flew to Finland yesterday, April 9, and today she reported to a police station, where she requested political asylum. In conversation with Mediazona, she explained she had feared for her safety in Ukraine, noting there had been incidents in the past when Russian political activists had been abducted by the Russian security services in Ukraine, while local human rights defenders had told her it was nearly impossible to obtain political asylum in Ukraine.

In late January of this year, Ms. Aksyonova reported her husband, Viktor Filinkov, had disappeared on his way to Petersburg’s Pulkovo Airport, whence he was due to fly to Kyiv. Soon, the Telegram channel of the Petersburg court system’s press service reported Filinkov had been remanded in custody on suspicion of involvement in a terrorist community, a crime under Article 205.4 Part 2 of the Russian Federal Criminal Code. Filinkov had, allegedly, confessed his guilt.

Screen shot of the message posted about Viktor Filinkov’s arrest on the Telegram channel of the Joint Press Service of the St. Petersburg Courts, January 25, 2018

Subsequently, during a visit by members of the Petersburg Public Monitoring Commission (PMC) to the Petersburg remand prison where he was jailed, Filinkov said he had confessed his guilt after being tortured with a taser by FSB officers. Mediazona published Filinkov’s account of the first days after he was detained, an account in which he described in great detail how FSB officers had tortured him and threatened his wife. In March, Filinkov was transferred to a remand prison just across the border from Petersburg in Leningrad Region, which is thus off limits to the Petersburg PMC members who had regularly visited him in the Petersburg remand prison.

Petersburg antifascist Igor Shishkin also vanished in late January only to turn up later as an arrestee in the same case. He confessed his guilt. Despite the fact that members of the Petersburg PMC found evidence of injuries on his body, Shishkin said nothing about torture.

However, Petersburger Ilya Kapustin, detained as a witness in the very same case, claimed he had been tortured by the FSB. In February, he filed a complaint with the Russian Investigative Committee. He left Russia in March to seek asylum in Finland.

The Petersburg antifascists were detained as part of a case against an alleged “terrorist community,” code-named The Network. Online news and commentary website Republic, which was granted access to the case files, wrote that the FSB believed the alleged “terrorist community” had cells in Moscow, Petersburg, Penza, and Belarus. Members of the alleged terrorist group had supposedly planned a series of bomb blasts during the March 18 presidential election and this summer’s FIFA World Cup, which will be held in Russia.

The criminal case kicked off in October 2017 with the arrest of four antifascists in Penza. A fifth suspect in Penza was placed under house arrest, while a sixth suspect was detained in Petersburg and transferred to the Penza Remand Prison. Several of these young men subsequently recounted how the FSB had tortured them and planted weapons in their cars and flats. In particular, Ilya Shakursky and Dmitry Pchelintsev reported they had been tortured. Pchelintsev soon retracted his testimony.

Translation and photo by the Russian Reader

NB. If you are just now happening on this horrifying tale of torture and “law enforcement” run amok, read the first major international media report on the case, in Newsweek, and then read my translations of articles from Mediazona, OVD Info, and the other independent Russian media outlets who have been covering the story since it broke in late January 2018.